Halloween is on the way and we love to decorate our house with lots of fun and cute spooky decorations. As part of all the Halloween festivities we are often searching for activities that we can do with young children or grandchildren but are also fun for us adults to join in with (sorry but coloring paper plates starts to get a little repetitive year after year!).
This year we were inspired by a project that we saw that looked easy, fun, gave great results and looked cheap to make – ‘Spooky’ Mason Jar candle holders. This project is a perfect at home craft or would be great to do at a school or church halloween party or at your own halloween party!
Here’s how we went about making these as well as our estimated cost and a rough estimate as to how long this took to complete.
Step 1:
Find a jar.
Mason jars have become very popular over the years so they can be found almost anywhere. Ideally you’ll get some that a plain (no embossing on the glass) but this is not a necessity – at a quick glance on Amazon we found some for roughly $2.50 a piece.
If you are really looking to be environmentally friendly (and make this project even cheaper) just grab a jar left over from cooking. We used a Prego Sauce jar that we had used for dinner the night before. Just make sure the jar is clean and that you remove any labels or glue residue.
Step 2:
Decide on how you want to decorate your Candle holder.
The possibilities are almost limitless for this. We did a pretty simple ghost and the word Boo as this was a project that our granddaughter helped with, but depending on how skilled you are, or if you have a Cricut machine, you could do lots!
We drew our ghost on a piece of paper and then cut it out to use as a stencil
Step 3:
We used contact paper (available in most dollar stores, craft stores, online etc) as a large roll of this costs roughly $6.00 or $7.00 and is enough to get a lot of design out of of.
We taped our template onto the contact paper and then used a knife to cut it out (if younger children are helping with this part be carefully with an Exacto knife – depending on how skilled you are with Exacto knife keeping the design simply will make this part even easier)
Step 4:
Apply the design you just cut out to the jar.
There are no rules as to where you put in and you could put a couple of different designs on one jar.
Step 5:
Paint!
Grammie’s Furniture Paint is ideal for this project because it sticks to glass easier that regular paints. Again, the color(s) you choose to use is completely up to you – check out our color palette here
Step 6:
Let it dry.
Always the hardest part! Give the paint time to dry before touching it. You can do just one coat of paint, or if you desire you could wait and apply a second coat once the first has dried completely.
Step 7:
Remove the stencils.
Using a knife or razor blade gently peel off the contact paper. Take it slow so that you don’t accidentally rip off any paint.
Step 8:
Fill the candle holder up and put in your candle!
We filled our jar up about one third of the way with sand (pebbles could also be used) and then placed a tea light on top.
Time:
Our project took us about 30 minutes plus 4-6 hours drying time. The majority of the time was spent cutting the stencil out ad cutting the contact paper. If we had a stencil already made (or bought from a store) , or a Cricut machine this time would be cut down even more.
Estimated Cost:
Jar – Our Prego Jar was free (and the sauce that came inside was really good). The cost of Mason jars is going to range anywhere from $1.00 – $3.00. Often times we find them at garage sales, thrift shops etc for even cheaper.
Contact Paper – A large roll could be between $4.00 – $7.00 depending on where you buy it. One large roll could get a lot of designs
Paint – Our 16oz paint is just $15.00 and similarly to the contact paper you could paint a lot of jars using one tub of 16oz paint
Sand or rocks to fill jar – A 50lb bag of sand costs $3.00 at Home Depot, this would fill a lot of jars!
Tea Light Candle – we found a 100 pack for $15.00 – this works out to .15 cents per candle
Total Estimated Cost per jar: $.50 – $.75 cents without purchasing a mason jar. $3.00 – $3.25 if you purchase a mason jar (at $2.50)
Recent Comments